If you think you're important enough for the FBI to go running at full speed into a courtroom and ask a very overworked judge for a court order, you probably overestimate your Evil Quotient.
Seriously, guys, it costs a butt-load of money to get a tap implemented, and the few agents qualified to do anything with one have big fish to fry. That torrent you're downloading is going to get you a mass-mailed bill in the mail, but it just ain't worth the attention of the feds.
Previous author had a point. The tinfoil hat brigade doth protest too much.
For those who use the Treo, there's an app called "versamail" (I think) which sync's the palm calendar with outlook as well. It's not real-time, but pretty close to it (I think mine is set for hourly updates.)
I don't think so. But, some kind of automated scanning would be helpful.
Too many times this is done by accident. Someone does a "reply all" and attaches an internal document, without realizing that external names are on the CC list.
Personally, I'd be grateful for some kind of app that would warn me when I'm about to do something, and so would most of the people I know.
As for the potential for getting someone in trouble for a racy joke... well, when in doubt, hit the "cancel" button.
Theoretically true of any criminal act, but by making an example of the ones you *do* happen to catch, you discourage others from doing the same thing.
Wonder how many people are going to be getting a little certified letter in the mail about 90-120 days from now.
Holy cow, I think I accidentally wandered off of slashdot and onto the website of some obscure hobby site frequented by cranky 80-year-olds reminiscing about a time that never actually existed.
Let's have a poll:
1) I want to run my email program and have it be secure.
2) All software vendors shall be required by federal law to comply with all RFCs and programming standards, whether or not those standards are important to the users of the software, beneficial to the public, or even relevant to anyone.
It's amazing watching someone post on Monday that windows users are too stupid to use the firewall properly. And on friday they post that MS is bad for making the firewall more difficult for virus writers to use as a spam relay.
File "traders" are a major expense for ISP's. They represent only about 2-4% of the customer base, yet they consume 60% of external bandwidth. They demand levels of service that really are more appropriate for commercial customers paying hundreds of dollars a month, and force network upgrades which cost millions of dollars and a lot of labor.
It's purely a financial decision - it is worth more to get rid of these customers than to keep them. When a competing telco or cable co is undercutting your prices by $5 a month and eating into your customer base, you need to reduce costs to compete.
There already is a voice and data circuit using the track and power rails, though the last time I saw one in action it was fairly primitive - able to relay slightly-scratchy voice from station to station, along with a *really* primitive fax-type service.
20 years later, I am sure they have much more sophisiticated stuff, and perhaps that will be the main network fabric which feeds low-power RF systems and collects data from traffic and other sensors.
Of course, part of me would like to help with the project just so I can really see what happens when you plug an ethernet cable into a 600V, 2000A feed.:)
I'm probably a little over the average age here, but I started playing when it was two games for a quarter and you got five balls per game. This was on a machine with mechanical reels for scorekeeping, and when you got a free game, a solenoid would fire off inside the case with a noise not unlike a.22 gunshot.
I can understand the economics of it, there's a hell of a lot of hand labor that goes into assembling a machine, and they need regular adjustments from a skilled mechanic, and have a lot of finicky ramps, switches, and rebound pads that break. For those of you under 40, just think of a severely overclocked P4 with a fan controller posessed by demons, and you'll get the idea.:-)
Still, I do miss the very mechanical, "real" feeling of a good pinball machine, and I hope some company carves out a nice niche market making them.
This has been possible for decades under several other systems, and to the best of my knowledge it's never actually occurred, mostly because those who are usually exempt from speeding tickets would lose their exemption.
This will be no different.
I'd like to break out the tinfoil hat on this one, but given the 30,000+ motor vehicle fatalities per year in the U.S. alone, I'm thinking the problem is that the isolation any anonymity of driving is the problem, not the solution.
I've gone through that wringer; wait five months, call a number, wait another five months.
I'd rather just buy a product for a reasonable price, and not have to invest hours of my time trying to actually get the price I was offered.
Best Buy and CompUSA have both saved me several thousand dollars, but not in the way they intended: They both make the actual process of purchasing a product into an unpleasant ordeal, and I end up just sticking a couple hundred bucks in computer equipment, DVD's, or whatever, on any surface that's handy and simply walking out without it.
My feeling is this: If I can't actually count on paying the price that's advertised, why should I trust the vendor on any other implied or stated promise?
Having multiple providers aggregating traffic info in real time would also allow for *much* better use of predictive caching, so an obscure but interesting site wouldn't be killed (or the owner bankrupted by the bandwidth bill!) when a link to their work gets posted.
There are a few tech companies in SLC, a good number of them in telecom development, but utah is a stub for the most part as far as the web is concerned.
I don't think it's a workable law, and impractical laws don't generally accrue respect for the legislatures authoring them.
That said....
BigAssRouter#conf t BigAssRouter(config)#int utah 0/0 BigAssRouter(config-if)#shut BigAssRouter(co nfig-if)#^Z % Configured from console by RagingSlashdotter
I have to admit I winced a little when I had to give my fingerprints to get a certain license.
I wonder how many of these concerns were raised when photography became reasonably common - i.e. the "average joe" could afford a camera and processing.
The only adverse use I've seen of this kind of data was an innocent guy that was identified, in a front-page photograph (snapped by an ATM) as a murder suspect.
Turned out the tech had mis-counted frames by one, and the guy on the front page of the paper was a cabbie who stopped to take out a few bucks. It was cleared up quickly and the police apologized profusely and publicly - though I'm sure he lost a few nights of sleep over it. (there was also some financial settlement from either the bank or the PD, but I don't recall the details on it)
I recently cleaned up my computer rats-nest at home and located no less than five wall-warts plugged in but with no equipment connected to them. Some I could remember; the old linksys router I bricked with a firmware idea, the DSL modem I replaced with cable a few months ago, and several others I just have no clue about. They join the existing crate full of cables in the garage.
Some accessory manufacturer will catch on and start building devices that don't each have a different shaped (linksys), voltage (belkin) or design (DELL!!!!) power brick, and they will clean up - moneywise, too.
I've had one of the original "Wave" tools for several years and it, along with my Inova LED flashlight, are the only tools I usually bother to bring with me to do field work.
The only thing I'm not a big fan of on the new one is the ability to lose parts of it. Not being able to lose the cutter, pliers, screwdriver, is what makes the leatherman so valuable to me.
My desktop machine is running windows XP, which runs all the office and game applications I need. A lot of specialty apps in my field run only on windows or solaris, so I picked the one that can also run half-life 2 after the kids are asleep.
I connect to a server running Linux because that serves as a platform for different applications. I know exactly what it's going to do, and the rich set of utilities fits well with my work. I can filter and manipilate data very quickly and interact with network gear without a lot of poorly-integrated third-party apps.
I've played a little with OSX, and I was impressed with it visually and the level "seamless" behavior. But it doesn't support the business applications I need and few of the games I like to play.
That said, the low price of the "mac mini" is tempting indeed. I'd like a desktop system that can run a browser, a basic spreadsheet and word processor, without the heat and noise of a typical intel box. When I'm feeling rich I might just get one to see if the bug bites me.
As anyone who renews their driver's license may note, government programs are shoestring operations. When there's 50 other program managers all begging for the same budget that you're planning to use for that cool disk array, the bridge repair usually wins.
When they say "working for the secret service", that means basically finding other thieves and turning them over for prosecution. He ain't getting a gun and a badge.
I've used the local one more than once. Only thing I've noticed is that it's sometimes fairly laggy even when there aren't more than one or two people on them.
And the sandwiches are pretty good, too. Strong coffee also:)
I am always happy to see an original idea catch on, but I think the bigger story is VoIP in general, especially the ones (vonage, cable co's) that make it look and feel exactly like the service people are used to - plain 'ol telephone service.
I made the prediction that VoIP would be obsoleted by drops in traditional telephone service, but I was wrong. Basic phone service, with minimal long distance service, still costs $50+ here.
Not sure I've seen a suit against a car maker for drunk driving, but I do remember at least one against GM for advertising the Corvette, and forcing a buyer to drive recklessly.. or so the suit claimed, anyway.
The best solution is to charge for email. A penny would be sufficient; even on the days when I work like a dog, I'd have a hard time spending more than 50 cents.
What to do with those pennies? Use them to set up and maintain a certification authority which verifies the sender of every email. We make the credit card companies pay for all the crap that fills our 3D mailboxes... why not make them pay for filling up the ones on my computer, which cost just as much to set up and maintain?
Mail lists would be an issue, but the solution there is to make better use of php-type forums.
Back around 1990, the FAA was spending large amounts of money providing flight planning and weather briefing services, most often to private or charter pilots - the big airlines already had their own services.
So they contracted with several companies to provide on-line (dial-up, 2400bps) weather data. Taxpayers got angry because they didn't like providing free computer service to pilots, everyone got a black eye.. so they went back to the old, expensive way.
Long ago, in a city far far away, I once needed to pound a nail into a cabinet. No hammer and nothing really resembling one. So I used the phone.
The old Western Electric desk phones really were that tough. The handsets were thick, solic plastic, with hand-installed carbon microphone and speaker, and if you slammed the phone down, you might just damage the furniture it sat on.
I actually had to *rent* a phone from the telco when I got my first service. I think it was about $2.80 a month, a buck higher than the minimum because I wanted a color other than black (red).
... since I've found that the presence of a high-recognition brand-name on any game almost guarantees that it's (A) boring, and (B) overpriced by about $20.
My thumbs and forefingers were so sore from this game that I needed to take tylenol. It is just amazingly addictive. The multiplayer part is very well done, and there's *zero* learning curve.
Slashdot Mirror
If you think you're important enough for the FBI to go running at full speed into a courtroom and ask a very overworked judge for a court order, you probably overestimate your Evil Quotient.
Seriously, guys, it costs a butt-load of money to get a tap implemented, and the few agents qualified to do anything with one have big fish to fry. That torrent you're downloading is going to get you a mass-mailed bill in the mail, but it just ain't worth the attention of the feds.
Previous author had a point. The tinfoil hat brigade doth protest too much.
For those who use the Treo, there's an app called "versamail" (I think) which sync's the palm calendar with outlook as well. It's not real-time, but pretty close to it (I think mine is set for hourly updates.)
I don't think so. But, some kind of automated scanning would be helpful.
Too many times this is done by accident. Someone does a "reply all" and attaches an internal document, without realizing that external names are on the CC list.
Personally, I'd be grateful for some kind of app that would warn me when I'm about to do something, and so would most of the people I know.
As for the potential for getting someone in trouble for a racy joke... well, when in doubt, hit the "cancel" button.
Theoretically true of any criminal act, but by making an example of the ones you *do* happen to catch, you discourage others from doing the same thing.
Wonder how many people are going to be getting a little certified letter in the mail about 90-120 days from now.
Holy cow, I think I accidentally wandered off of slashdot and onto the website of some obscure hobby site frequented by cranky 80-year-olds reminiscing about a time that never actually existed.
Let's have a poll:
1) I want to run my email program and have it be secure.
2) All software vendors shall be required by federal law to comply with all RFCs and programming standards, whether or not those standards are important to the users of the software, beneficial to the public, or even relevant to anyone.
It's amazing watching someone post on Monday that windows users are too stupid to use the firewall properly. And on friday they post that MS is bad for making the firewall more difficult for virus writers to use as a spam relay.
File "traders" are a major expense for ISP's. They represent only about 2-4% of the customer base, yet they consume 60% of external bandwidth. They demand levels of service that really are more appropriate for commercial customers paying hundreds of dollars a month, and force network upgrades which cost millions of dollars and a lot of labor.
It's purely a financial decision - it is worth more to get rid of these customers than to keep them. When a competing telco or cable co is undercutting your prices by $5 a month and eating into your customer base, you need to reduce costs to compete.
There already is a voice and data circuit using the track and power rails, though the last time I saw one in action it was fairly primitive - able to relay slightly-scratchy voice from station to station, along with a *really* primitive fax-type service.
:)
20 years later, I am sure they have much more sophisiticated stuff, and perhaps that will be the main network fabric which feeds low-power RF systems and collects data from traffic and other sensors.
Of course, part of me would like to help with the project just so I can really see what happens when you plug an ethernet cable into a 600V, 2000A feed.
I'm probably a little over the average age here, but I started playing when it was two games for a quarter and you got five balls per game. This was on a machine with mechanical reels for scorekeeping, and when you got a free game, a solenoid would fire off inside the case with a noise not unlike a .22 gunshot.
:-)
I can understand the economics of it, there's a hell of a lot of hand labor that goes into assembling a machine, and they need regular adjustments from a skilled mechanic, and have a lot of finicky ramps, switches, and rebound pads that break. For those of you under 40, just think of a severely overclocked P4 with a fan controller posessed by demons, and you'll get the idea.
Still, I do miss the very mechanical, "real" feeling of a good pinball machine, and I hope some company carves out a nice niche market making them.
This has been possible for decades under several other systems, and to the best of my knowledge it's never actually occurred, mostly because those who are usually exempt from speeding tickets would lose their exemption.
This will be no different.
I'd like to break out the tinfoil hat on this one, but given the 30,000+ motor vehicle fatalities per year in the U.S. alone, I'm thinking the problem is that the isolation any anonymity of driving is the problem, not the solution.
I've gone through that wringer; wait five months, call a number, wait another five months.
I'd rather just buy a product for a reasonable price, and not have to invest hours of my time trying to actually get the price I was offered.
Best Buy and CompUSA have both saved me several thousand dollars, but not in the way they intended: They both make the actual process of purchasing a product into an unpleasant ordeal, and I end up just sticking a couple hundred bucks in computer equipment, DVD's, or whatever, on any surface that's handy and simply walking out without it.
My feeling is this: If I can't actually count on paying the price that's advertised, why should I trust the vendor on any other implied or stated promise?
Having multiple providers aggregating traffic info in real time would also allow for *much* better use of predictive caching, so an obscure but interesting site wouldn't be killed (or the owner bankrupted by the bandwidth bill!) when a link to their work gets posted.
There are a few tech companies in SLC, a good number of them in telecom development, but utah is a stub for the most part as far as the web is concerned.
o nfig-if)#^Z
I don't think it's a workable law, and impractical laws don't generally accrue respect for the legislatures authoring them.
That said....
BigAssRouter#conf t
BigAssRouter(config)#int utah 0/0
BigAssRouter(config-if)#shut
BigAssRouter(c
% Configured from console by RagingSlashdotter
I have to admit I winced a little when I had to give my fingerprints to get a certain license.
I wonder how many of these concerns were raised when photography became reasonably common - i.e. the "average joe" could afford a camera and processing.
The only adverse use I've seen of this kind of data was an innocent guy that was identified, in a front-page photograph (snapped by an ATM) as a murder suspect.
Turned out the tech had mis-counted frames by one, and the guy on the front page of the paper was a cabbie who stopped to take out a few bucks. It was cleared up quickly and the police apologized profusely and publicly - though I'm sure he lost a few nights of sleep over it. (there was also some financial settlement from either the bank or the PD, but I don't recall the details on it)
I recently cleaned up my computer rats-nest at home and located no less than five wall-warts plugged in but with no equipment connected to them. Some I could remember; the old linksys router I bricked with a firmware idea, the DSL modem I replaced with cable a few months ago, and several others I just have no clue about. They join the existing crate full of cables in the garage.
Some accessory manufacturer will catch on and start building devices that don't each have a different shaped (linksys), voltage (belkin) or design (DELL!!!!) power brick, and they will clean up - moneywise, too.
I've had one of the original "Wave" tools for several years and it, along with my Inova LED flashlight, are the only tools I usually bother to bring with me to do field work.
The only thing I'm not a big fan of on the new one is the ability to lose parts of it. Not being able to lose the cutter, pliers, screwdriver, is what makes the leatherman so valuable to me.
My desktop machine is running windows XP, which runs all the office and game applications I need. A lot of specialty apps in my field run only on windows or solaris, so I picked the one that can also run half-life 2 after the kids are asleep.
I connect to a server running Linux because that serves as a platform for different applications. I know exactly what it's going to do, and the rich set of utilities fits well with my work. I can filter and manipilate data very quickly and interact with network gear without a lot of poorly-integrated third-party apps.
I've played a little with OSX, and I was impressed with it visually and the level "seamless" behavior. But it doesn't support the business applications I need and few of the games I like to play.
That said, the low price of the "mac mini" is tempting indeed. I'd like a desktop system that can run a browser, a basic spreadsheet and word processor, without the heat and noise of a typical intel box. When I'm feeling rich I might just get one to see if the bug bites me.
As anyone who renews their driver's license may note, government programs are shoestring operations. When there's 50 other program managers all begging for the same budget that you're planning to use for that cool disk array, the bridge repair usually wins.
When they say "working for the secret service", that means basically finding other thieves and turning them over for prosecution. He ain't getting a gun and a badge.
I've used the local one more than once. Only thing I've noticed is that it's sometimes fairly laggy even when there aren't more than one or two people on them.
:)
And the sandwiches are pretty good, too. Strong coffee also
I am always happy to see an original idea catch on, but I think the bigger story is VoIP in general, especially the ones (vonage, cable co's) that make it look and feel exactly like the service people are used to - plain 'ol telephone service.
I made the prediction that VoIP would be obsoleted by drops in traditional telephone service, but I was wrong. Basic phone service, with minimal long distance service, still costs $50+ here.
Not sure I've seen a suit against a car maker for drunk driving, but I do remember at least one against GM for advertising the Corvette, and forcing a buyer to drive recklessly.. or so the suit claimed, anyway.
The best solution is to charge for email. A penny would be sufficient; even on the days when I work like a dog, I'd have a hard time spending more than 50 cents.
What to do with those pennies? Use them to set up and maintain a certification authority which verifies the sender of every email. We make the credit card companies pay for all the crap that fills our 3D mailboxes... why not make them pay for filling up the ones on my computer, which cost just as much to set up and maintain?
Mail lists would be an issue, but the solution there is to make better use of php-type forums.
Back around 1990, the FAA was spending large amounts of money providing flight planning and weather briefing services, most often to private or charter pilots - the big airlines already had their own services.
So they contracted with several companies to provide on-line (dial-up, 2400bps) weather data. Taxpayers got angry because they didn't like providing free computer service to pilots, everyone got a black eye.. so they went back to the old, expensive way.
Long ago, in a city far far away, I once needed to pound a nail into a cabinet. No hammer and nothing really resembling one. So I used the phone.
The old Western Electric desk phones really were that tough. The handsets were thick, solic plastic, with hand-installed carbon microphone and speaker, and if you slammed the phone down, you might just damage the furniture it sat on.
I actually had to *rent* a phone from the telco when I got my first service. I think it was about $2.80 a month, a buck higher than the minimum because I wanted a color other than black (red).
You'll excuse me now while I go take my geritol.
... since I've found that the presence of a high-recognition brand-name on any game almost guarantees that it's (A) boring, and (B) overpriced by about $20.
My thumbs and forefingers were so sore from this game that I needed to take tylenol. It is just amazingly addictive. The multiplayer part is very well done, and there's *zero* learning curve.